


One Month

by despitethewives (choirboyharem)



Category: Tiny Meat Gang (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Siblings, Angst and Fluff and Smut, M/M, Step-Sibling Incest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-23
Updated: 2020-03-23
Packaged: 2021-03-01 01:01:50
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,549
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23276767
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/choirboyharem/pseuds/despitethewives
Summary: Cody’s lips parted in a shuddering breath and Noel pulled his mouth away, a dewdrop trail of spit shining on his lip. His eyes darted up to meet Cody’s, daring him. Daring him to do anything or to say a single fucking word. What the fuck were they doing?Cody’s lips parted in an attempt to actually voice the question that couldn’t stop knocking around in his brain like a tricked-out Windows 98 pinball game:What the fuck are we doing?
Relationships: Cody Ko/Noel Miller
Comments: 30
Kudos: 112





	One Month

**Author's Note:**

> you don’t have to tell me how fucked up this is, i already know. please mind the tags and don’t venture anywhere that might cause you distress or harm.

“Ow, fuck, Jesus.”

“Let me get out—“ 

“I’ve gotta get out first.”

“Fuck you, man.” 

“My chest,” Cody whined. “Your elbow, it, like, it perforated my goddamn ribcage.”

“Baby,” Noel chided him, throwing a pillow that had fallen sometime during the night at Cody’s wounded chest. “Should’ve let me out.”

Cody whined again, wordlessly, rolling onto his stomach. The clothes he’d fallen asleep in last night stuck to him like if the taste of stagnant water had a texture. He hugged Noel’s side of the bed, another pillow and an armful of the comforter, and buried his face in them. They smelled like salt and sweat and spice and rum and a sugary stickiness. 

“Get your ass up. You’re taking me and the boys to the studio in an hour.”

“What?” Cody’s hair, floppy and wispy and bleach-burnt, stuck to his skin and flew to the air where it missed his current oil-and-water complexion. It made itself known as its own entity when he unstuck himself from Noel’s bedclothes and looked up in confused misery. “I’m hungover as shit.”

“Ain’t as hungover as me. I’ll let you take my car, how’s that?” The shirt Noel seemed to yank out of the dresser at random was Cody’s, but it had somehow found its way into Noel’s room regardless. They just always ended up melding together no matter what they did. Half of each of them were the same person. 

“That’s Dad’s car. Technically, it’s Dad’s car. And it’s still ugly, sorry.”

“Cool, then we’re taking your car. Mom’s car. And I’m gonna have to deal with people seeing me in it and wanting to kick my ass just for being in a car like that.” 

“My car’s not gay,” Cody mumbled into Noel’s pillow. 

Noel sighed and clicked his teeth. “Car’s gay, bro.” 

“...whatever. Fine. I’ll take your fucking car.” 

* * *

Cody was a year younger. A year and a few months. Noel was freshly eighteen and Cody was still mustily sixteen, clinging to the back of Noel’s shirt as if it would keep him from growing up and running away. Noel had just recently escaped from underneath the thumb of their parents, kicking and screaming the whole way, and had exactly one month left before the fall semester started. 

One month left. It felt like a bear trap around Cody’s throat. 

One month. Noel laughed his sharp, high, chittering, scorched-throat laugh at something Noah had said, tipping his head back against the passenger seat and clapping his hand against his chest. It filled Cody with an endlessly familiar warmth. 

One month. Cody’s head pounded in time with his heart and each second passing closer to August twenty-second. 

“Bruh, watch the fuckin’ road; what are you even looking at?” 

Cody blinked and found himself doing seventy when he should’ve been doing forty-five. “I am,” he muttered, slowing down. 

“You fuck this car up any more than I already have before I leave this month, and I’m selling your fuckin’ organs on the dark web before I leave next month.”

“I’m slowing down! I’m slowing down, Jesus.” Cody exhaled and straightened up. “I’m slowing down right now.”

“You’re such a lightweight, dude,” Noel murmured, his knuckles brushing Cody’s knee when he reached for his phone on the aux cord. They lingered. Cody felt the spot on his pants singe with the touch. 

* * *

Their parents were gone all week and they’d left Noel in charge of food. It really meant that they’d left Noel in charge of Postmates. 

On Wednesday, they ordered from some place that had advertised themselves as the _“landmark of the French dip sandwich”._ Cody had asked what a French dip was and Noel had asked him if he knew literally anything about food, shortly before admitting that he didn’t know what they were either. They’d turned out to be beef sandwiches with thin gravy that you dipped them into. Hence the name. Cody had suspended his veganism for the week so he could eat as much and as messily as he wanted without feeling guilty, so on Wednesday night, he sucked and licked gravy off his fingers when it ran down his hand. 

He caught Noel’s eye, two slick, dark fingers raised halfway. He hadn’t known how long Noel had been looking, but Cody definitely knew how hard he was looking now. 

“What?” Cody asked, staring back. 

“C’mere. You look gross.” Noel took Cody by the wrist and pulled him closer. Looking at the TV screen, he licked over Cody’s fingers and caught what he could in one broad stroke of his tongue. 

“Oh my God, _you’re_ fucking gross.” Cody blushed and jerked away, grabbing at the handful of napkins dropped haphazardly on the coffee table. “Stop it.”

“Stupid little messy boy,” Noel said, higher-pitched and purposefully shitty and mocking. “Stupid little messy boy who can’t clean himself up. Needs Daddy to clean him up.”

“I’m literally gonna murder you, dude, I’m not even playing. What the fuck are you even talking about?” Despite himself, Cody’s blush worsened. He threw his crumpled napkin on the table, folding his arms and sinking back into the couch. 

Noel looked over at him and snorted. “You’re fucking, like, so red right now; what’s up?” 

“Suck my dick. You’re a freak. That’s what’s up.”

“Yeah, I’m a freak.” Noel swallowed the last of his sandwich and leaned back, his shoulder jutting into the couch so he could leer at Cody properly. _“I’m_ a freak. Not you, though.”

Cody scowled. “Yeah, no, you are.”

“Yeah, okay.” Noel’s voice sounded like a toasted marshmallow, dark and rich and dripping with too much sugar for it to be natural. “Alright. Whatever you say.” His fingers curled around Cody’s wrist again and raised Cody’s hand until he could press his lips against paler, smoother knuckles. Hands soft and slender like bird talons, smooth and virginal from never getting into fights. Always using them to help keep his nose clean instead of letting it run. 

Except for when doors were closed and the blinds were down and their voices echoed in each other’s ears without a single interruption, the TV offering background noise to keep them from thinking too hard.

Thinking about one month. What they were doing. What the fuck were they doing? 

Cody’s fingers slipped into Noel’s mouth and he dragged his tongue around the tips. What the fuck were they _doing?_

Cody’s lips parted in a shuddering breath and Noel pulled his mouth away, a dewdrop trail of spit shining on his lip. His eyes darted up to meet Cody’s, daring him. Daring him to do anything or to say a single fucking word. What the fuck were they doing?

Cody’s lips parted in an attempt to actually voice the question that couldn’t stop knocking around in his brain like a tricked-out Windows 98 pinball game: _What the fuck are we doing?_

His lips were closed again when they met Noel’s and he didn’t get a chance to say a goddamn thing.

* * *

Cody felt like he was drunk again. His tongue moved sloppily with Noel’s, licking the taste of pepper and rosemary and French bread out of his mouth. 

He wanted to be drunk again. He didn’t want to think that this would be a thing he would do sober. That this was a thing they only ever did while they were either drunk or high. Or maybe they were just too young and didn’t know any better. 

But sometimes they didn’t have an excuse. Sometimes they were on the couch and the food was getting cold and they were somewhere vaguely halfway through Baby Driver and they were too old to be doing this anymore but neither of them would stop. 

They were eight and nine and Cody was crying in Noel’s bed because he missed the memory of his mom and she’d died three years ago to the day. 

They were nine and eleven and they were kissing like Noel had seen in a movie that he and his friends had snuck into. 

They were thirteen and fourteen and they’d learned that jerking off was just better if someone else did it for you. 

They were fourteen and fifteen and they hadn’t talked about what they did or what they’d been doing ever since.

Noel was a freak, sure. He was, but Cody was worse. His heart was cracked open and bleeding, aching openly for his brother’s approval, praise, touch, affection, anything that made him feel like he had a place in the world. Like he deserved more than what he got. Like he had a right to ask for it. 

Noel’s name came out of his mouth in a whimper when he tilted his head up, his eyes shut tight. Noel’s lips and tongue and teeth left the briefest indentations in Cody’s neck, digging in, incisors catching on the same places that they had for years. 

“Deeper,” Cody whispered. “W-want it to hurt.”

Noel huffed out a sharp, small laugh and curled his fingers in Cody’s hair, sinking his teeth into Cody’s neck and pulling. Cody felt tears jump to his eyes as his hips snapped up against Noel’s. 

* * *

Going from the living room to Noel’s bedroom as freely as they did was exhilarating. Even though he knew their parents were in Pasadena, Cody still felt fear and adrenaline pump through him when Noel pinned him against the wall of the hallway. Their parents’ bedroom door still stared them down, looming, the ever-present, inherent guilt tying bricks to their feet. It was totally, obviously inescapable. 

It was a toss-up on whether or not they’d talk. They usually didn’t. Talking led to thinking and, again, that was a luxury they couldn’t afford. Everything they did say was short, just urges or nudges or obnoxious teasing, nothing more than they could handle. 

“Do you have—?”

“Yeah.”

“You wanna go, like. You know. You want to...?”

“Yeah, I do.”

And, probably just to keep Cody from responding in turn, Noel pushed him onto the bed and knocked the air from his lungs. Cody moved through his lightheaded daze, kicking his shoes off and shoving down the jeans that had been undone and worked down to the middle of his hips in the hallway. Noel’s shirt and sweatpants fell to the floor somewhere, swallowed up by the rest of the mess that consumed the room. 

Noel’s weight, firm and solid and heavy despite how slim and tiny he really was, was a sense of comfort beyond anything else. Cody would’ve gladly been crushed by it if it were possible. His leg hooked up over Noel’s hip, his arms wrapping around Noel’s lanky back and holding him close. _Please tell me what the fuck we’re doing,_ Cody thought, kissing Noel like they’d already run out of time. _Tell me what the fuck we’re doing before you go away and leave me for months. You fucking asshole._

It drew Cody’s chest tight until his ribs felt liable to snap. Maybe if he held Noel tighter, it would keep him there. It would keep the two of them there in that bed forever and nothing on the outside of the door would even matter. Not time or space or fucking anything at all. 

* * *

“Fucking slut.”

“Don’t,” Cody whined. Noel laughed at him and kissed the inside of his thigh, curling fingers up inside Cody and dragging them forward. Cody moaned, the sound pulling out of him from the inside of his bones, his hips coming up off the bed. 

“Been wanting to fuck you like this for years,” Noel muttered, sliding a third finger inside Cody. “Listen to how you really sound.”

The scrambling for revulsion wasn’t nearly enough to mask the wave of heat that rolled over Cody, the shock of it making his cock twitch. His trembling mouth formed the only word he could. 

_“Please.”_

* * *

Cody gasped when Noel dragged him up off the bed, fingers scrambling at angled shoulders. Noel’s fingernails dug into Cody’s shoulder blades, his mouth open and panting near enough to Cody’s that it felt dizzying. The angle forced Cody lower and he sank down onto Noel’s cock, taking him in. Taking all of him. In Noel’s lap, he’d never felt smaller and more manhandled, now just feeling drunk on that feeling alone. 

Before he had a chance to process it, Noel pushed Cody onto his back again. There wasn’t a degree of separation this time and Cody felt so full that he could cry. With his legs high around Noel’s waist, Cody hugged one arm around Noel’s back, the other one angled so he could grab as much of a fistful as he could get of Noel’s hair. Noel breathed into Cody’s neck, harsh and unstable, as he began to move again. 

“Fuck, h-holy fuck, th-that—that feels—“ Cody sobbed, cutting himself off as his nails raised white lines across Noel’s skin, his heel digging hard into Noel’s back. _“Noel.”_

“That’s right, fucking sing for me, baby.” Noel sounded absolutely broken, heaven-sent, desperate, beyond anything Cody had ever heard from him before. He never talked while this was happening. Not ever. Even if Cody couldn’t shut up, Noel could. Noel’s hips slammed against Cody and Cody dug his fingernails even deeper. He was so close to snapping, wound and taut. “Say my fucking name.” 

Cody did. He came so hard he almost blacked out. 

* * *

_One month,_ Cody thought before he opened his eyes again. He was exhausted and sweat-slicked, his stomach stained with spunk. 

He looked at Noel with a dopey half-smile. One month didn’t matter because that was then and this was now.

Noel laughed softly and rolled onto his back. “Don’t look at me like that, man.”

“Like what?”

“You know what. That puppy shit. Knock it off.” Noel sat up, his legs dangling over the side of the bed. He exhaled and dipped his head, rubbing his eyes. “Jesus,” he said quietly. He seemed to make an attempt to look over his shoulder, turning his head with downcast eyes. “You know, we can’t... We’re grown up, Cody.”

Cody frowned, unable to take his eyes off the new bruise and the scratch marks on Noel’s back. “I—okay? So?”

“So this can’t just, like. Go on. Not like this.”

Cody swallowed. “Why?”

“I mean, not forever. We gotta fuckin’ break whatever, like... this, uh, fuckin’, I don’t know, whatever this habit is,” Noel mumbled, getting to his feet. “Can’t be thirty years old and still doing this shit.” 

Cody felt anxiety and heart-pounding shame sink into him, peeling away his happiness like a clementine. “Are you just saying this ‘cause you’re leaving?”

“The fuck does that have to do with anything?”

“Well, you feel shitty about leaving, and, you know, uh, leaving me, so I thought... yeah. It’s whatever.” Cody’s voice wavered and he hated himself for it. “Doesn’t matter.” 

Noel pulled his sweatpants back on as he laughed again, a lot colder and shorter. It sounded like a wind chime made from teeth. “I’m talking about _now,_ alright? I’m talking about how this shit ain’t normal and it’s never gonna be normal and we gotta stop trying to make it feel normal.”

Cody felt like a child when his eyes started to sting. “Who cares? Why do we have to talk about this now?” 

“When else were we gonna talk about it? We got all night! We got five more days!”

“Stop, stop, I don’t care, I don’t give a shit! We literally don’t have to talk about it at all! I don’t give a fuck about being normal!”

“Yeah, you don’t. You don’t have to.”

_“What?”_

“I said you don’t have to.” Noel pulled his shirt over his head and threw Cody’s jeans at him. Cody’s shaky fingers wrapped around them as he stared up at Noel, utterly miserable and infuriated, dying to get that second of afterglow back. 

“What does that even fucking mean?”

“You know, it’s cool for you to keep fuckin’ sitting around, like, goddamn pining for me or whatever, but I’ve got shit to do. I got a career ahead of me, I got a social life, I got school this fall, I got Aleena—“ 

“Oh my God, it’s not my fault you feel guilty about it! Jesus Christ, dude, just admit that you feel shitty about leaving! That you feel shitty about totally abandoning me and not going anywhere closer! It had to be near fucking Fresno, didn’t it? It couldn’t be anywhere closer! You feel like shit about just leaving me here for the next four years and it’s all my fault! It’s all me!” Cody felt tears bead and slip down his cheeks as he looked away, staring at the wall and scrubbing the back of his hand over his face. 

He jumped when the door slammed shut and it began his crying jag in full force. 

* * *

Cody couldn’t bring himself to get out of Noel’s bed. He watched the sunlight go from golden and orange and red to purple and blue as it sank behind rows of houses and palm trees that waved back to him in the wind whenever he blinked. 

He hugged Noel’s pillow and closed his eyes, unable to shake the feeling of just wanting to be held. 

* * *

Cody was half asleep when he felt the mattress depress. He kept his eyes shut, maintaining his steady breathing. 

He felt a warm hand touch his hair, then his cheek. A second passed and he felt cotton slide down over his mouth and nose. His arms were lifted one by one, guided gently through the shirt being worked over his head. He didn’t move a muscle. Another second passed and his legs were lifted as well. 

The mattress creaked as the weight was removed. Cody heard a brief shuffle of feet, then felt lips on his forehead, smooth and cold and a little dry. 

The bedroom door closed for the second time that night, although Cody barely heard it that time. 

* * *

It was almost three in the morning when Cody found himself standing at the foot of the stairs, the light from the TV flickering in colors that moved too rapidly for his hazy, sleep-slack vision to follow. The floor creaked underneath his feet and the limp figure on the living room couch straightened up, looking over at him. 

Cody gave Noel a tiny, brief wave. Noel gave him a soft half-smile in response, as good an invitation as any. Cody took it. 

Walking around to the front of the couch with Noel’s quilt bundled around him, Cody collapsed onto the cushions and into Noel’s empty, waiting side. Noel slid his arm underneath the blanket and around Cody, pulling him in. 

“Thanks,” Cody whispered, closing his eyes again. 

“Don’t worry about it.” 

* * *

They woke up with the quilt on the floor and their limbs tangled and mismatched. Noel was sprawled underneath Cody, an indelicate and endearing image. 

Noel seemed to glitter in the morning sun. His manly, beard-burn-y stubble glittered. His fluffy little locks of hair glittered. His skin, the shade of coffee with an indulgent amount of cream, glittered. He really was every kind of beautiful and it was just another thing that was only ever going to make it all worse. 

When Noel finally stirred, Cody acted on impulse, leaning in and kissing him awake to see if that was something that would actually work. He felt fingers in his hair, rubbing white blond chunks until they were even frizzier than they already were, as Noel returned it. As lazy and languid as it was, it did, in fact, work. 

Cody pulled away to press his forehead against Noel’s instead. “‘Morning.”

“Slut. Get the fuck off me. You’re still heavy.” 

“Only if you buy me breakfast.”

“You’re getting McDonald’s, bitch.” 

Cody grinned and pushed himself off Noel, his hair following its morning routine and sticking straight up in the air. It was even worse now that Noel had been messing with it. “And then you’re taking me to Zumiez.”

Noel groaned and rubbed his eyes, sitting up against the arm of the couch. “I ain’t spending any more goddamn money on you this week.” 

“I’ve got money! I’ve got, like, two-hundred in cash right now.” 

“Yeah, but every time we go out, it doesn’t get spent.”

“I pay for my own clothes. I do. All the time.” 

“Yeah, man, whatever. I bought you that shirt you’re wearing.” Noel dragged himself off the couch and headed for the staircase. “Put some shoes on.”

“Fine, whatever. Hey, um, dude.” Cody looked at Noel over the back of the couch. “I’m... I’m sorry about, uh, last ni—“

“Forget it, doesn’t fuckin’ matter. We both said some stupid shit.” Noel shook his head and started up the stairs. “Forget what it was even about. It was dumb. Find some shoes or I’m leaving your ass here.” 

“Yeah. Cool.” Cody watched Noel disappear, idly rubbing the fabric of the shirt he’d been given last night between his fingers. Looking down at it, he realized it was Noel’s shirt. 

_One month,_ he thought, bringing the shirt up to his face and inhaling the scent of it, knowing full well he wasn’t going to let Noel take this shirt when he left. _One month._


End file.
